Manchester Big Wheel set to spin for final time on Sunday

Manchester's big wheel will take its final spin on Sunday – before closing for good. The landmark attraction will shut at 6pm before being taken down and moved out of the city. The 190ft wheel is expected to take 10 days to take down, marking the end of an era.

Manchester's big wheel will take its final spin on Sunday – before closing for good.

The landmark attraction will shut at 6pm before being taken down and moved out of the city.

The 190ft wheel is expected to take 10 days to take down, marking the end of an era.

It is the second of two wheels that have dominated the Manchester skyline for eight years, clocking up to 500,000 rides a year.

Great City Attractions, who operate the wheel, announced in February that it would turn for its final time after being asked to leave Manchester to make way for the city’s official Olympics viewing spot. The firm bid to keep it in Manchester by moving it to Piccadilly Gardens. But city centre chiefs said no, saying it limited space in a key public area.

Great City Attractions is now looking for a new home for the wheel elsewhere in Britain.

They are expecting to hear next week whether a bid to take it to Edinburgh has been successful.

Take a trip on the Manchester Big Wheel below ...

John Lowery, the company’s operations manager, said: "We wanted to stay in Manchester and have explored other locations, including extending the stay in Exchange Square or moving to Piccadilly Gardens, but have been unsuccessful. It’s a shame."

Pat Karney, Manchester’s city centre spokesman, said: "I’m disappointed that we weren’t able to find another location in the city centre but its to do with the lack of public squares the Victorians left us in Manchester.

"We already have incredible difficulties using Piccadilly Gardens for events and moving the wheel there would significantly limit the use of the space.

"Although I brought the wheel to Manchester and I’ve been a big fan of it – though I’ve never been on it as I’m scared of heights – I think most people who want to have been on it and it appears quite quiet during the week.

"I think it has probably run its course in terms of an attraction."

MANCHESTER’S first big wheel was installed in Exchange Square as a temporary attraction for Christmas 2004.

Within days, it had played host to its first marriage proposal when 18-year-old Matthew Wood popped the question to nursery nurse Donna Cox in a VIP gondola, originally created for French president Jacques Chirac during the attraction’s two-year stint on Paris’ Champs Elysee. The wheel attracted controversy just weeks later when two Fathers 4 Justice protesters, dressed as Santas, were arrested after climbing and chaining themselves to the 365-tonne attraction.

A new wheel returned the following year, complete with M.E.N. branding – but only for Christmas. It returned again in 2006 and rolled back into town in May 2007 to become a permanent fixture.

December 2007 saw drama at 190ft when a power failure sent the lights out and left families trapped mid-ride.

The following year saw the attraction cement its future in the city as part of a deal in which operators agreed to sponsor a New Year’s Eve fireworks display to usher in 2009.

VISITORS to Manchester gave the thumbs-up to the big wheel as they became some of the last people to take a ride.

IT worker Alex Mckenzie, 22, from Birmingham, said the Olympics were a good enough reason for the wheel to be moved. He said: "The Olympics is such a worldwide event so it will be good for people in the city to have a place to gather and watch events unfold.

"I think the wheel should come back and be placed exactly where it is when the Olympics are over, though."

Bury born singer songwriter Sally Corlett, 35, enjoyed a ride on the wheel with her son Saul, five. She said: "It’s a shame it is going because it is interesting up there.

"I would go up there again and would have thought they would have kept it in the city while events like the Olympics are on this summer because more people would go on it and be able to see Manchester from above."

Olalekan Giwa, 34, assistant manager of the wheel, said it was sad the wheel was going.

He said: "Manchester is losing something that has become a tourism landmark.

"People from outside Manchester love to come and see the wheel. It’s been a great attraction."

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